"I am Starro! I have selected you three starfish - - who must be distant relatives of mine - - to help me conquer this planet!"-Giant alien starfish Starro, who could have picked Luthor, Joker or Mirror Master, or even a crab with sharp pincers, showing why patronage is ill-advised. From his defeat in The Brave and the Bold #28 (1960).

October 13, 2005

Treadmill Year Two In Review

Yesterday the Comic Treadmill reached its second anniversary, blogoversary or blogday, whichever term you prefer. If you donít mind me saying so, hooray for us.

And what better time to look back on the past year than now? Especially because Iím afraid to even look at another blog until I get a chance to get up to the comics shop and get Infinite Crisis.

First, let's get the highlight of the year out of the way. It's not even close. The day I gave Mag this Fred Hembeck recreation of Iron Man 157 was the best comics-related day of the year. Kudos to Fred for assisting in delivering the coup de grace in this decades old war with the evil Mag.

So Iíll be reflecting on my highlights of the Year on the Treadmill as well as changes that blogging has done for my buying habits. Letís start with the latter first:

1) When I started blogging, my purchases were probably split 75/25 in favor of DC as opposed to Marvel, a marked change from the early 1980ís when Marvel enjoyed a 50/50 split and an 80/20 advantage in my voluminous purchasing of back issues. Now I donít buy any Marvels. The company that used to successfully project the image of welcoming all readers now successfully projects a feeling of contempt for them;

2) When I started blogging the only independent titles I was buying were ones written by Alan Moore and Kurt Busiek. I was too reluctant to take a chance absent guidance from sources whose opinions I could count on. Now Iím much more willing to buy new books by untested creators Ė as long as I trust the reviews on other blogs. Iíve also been fortunate enough to get a fair amount of review copies of independent works;

3) The number of current ongoing titles I buy remains fairly steady Ė about 10-12 a month, but Iím giving a lot more independent titles a chance and my reprint collection buying of DC is strong as is my weakness for stuff in Previews that no rational person would buy. Result: I am spending more money on comics a year now than I did on the average for the 10 years before I started blogging.

4) Iíd like to buy more ongoing titles, but my stack of unread books is simply too high to justify adding new titles absent extenuating circumstances. I have over 2 years of Fables sitting unread and constantly dodge spoilers for whatís been happening. One day (yeah, right) Iíll get caught up and start adding more titles.

5) My back issue/reprint buying in the 1990ís consisted mostly of E-Bay bargain hunting and DC Archives from Silver Age Comics. Now that Iíve been gradually indexing my comics and have a better list of what I do and donít already have (the days when I could remember every gap are as distant a memory as when every teenager owned a turntable) Iíve been able to send periodic wish lists to the always reliable Mike Sterling of Ralphís Comics Corner and when the local shop has sales, I can spend without fear of buying something I already have.

So much for that. Now letís take a look at highlights of the year beginning October 13, 2004:

October 2004:

October was a relatively light month. Iíll unapologetically confess to being distracted by the Red Sox.

The most popular entry comments-wise was my farewell to Marvel as its contempt for its readers got to be more than I could handle. The decline of story telling across the Marvel universe was a contributing factor. I miss my Marvel friends and remain confident that there will be an editorial shake-up in the near future with a return to a focus on solid story telling. As soon as it happens, Iíll be back.

Index-wise I wrapped up Birds of Prey, including the Gail Simone era, one which has been delightful and deserves more acclaim. So hereís more Ė Gail Simoneís Birds of Prey is a fantastic monthly comic with an intriguing cast of characters both old and new, clear long range writing plans, a variety of story types and excellent dialog. Buy it. Read it. Enjoy it.

Also in the indexing department, my independent comic index reached Airboy, an old favorite from the 1980ís. Ironically, although I enjoyed Chuck Dixonís writing for Airboy, I didnít care for it on Birds of Prey. Fickle, arenít I?

Mag was quite musical in November as he reminded the world of the lyrics to the song ďThe Final Revenge of LuthorĒ and wrapped up his series enabling any and all Treadmillers to hear the glory that was 1970ís Songs and Stories of the Justice League.

On the Archive front, I reviewed my favorite of all the Archives Ė The Black Canary. I had so much to say it took 3 parts to finish, constituting all of my indexing for the month.

Our readers showed that their prognostic powers were second only to some when Jean Loring finished 4th in our poll as to who the Identity Crisis killer was. Jean got 25 votes. I canít even remember the rationale for including her in the poll choices. I blew my vote on Capt. Boomerang, R.I.P. Digger, I miss ya.

January 2005:

The highlight of this month was the previously mentioned deliverance of the killing blow in Spores Wars when I gave Mag a Fred Hembeck recreation of the cover of the infamous Iron Man 157 as a Christmas present. Despite a feeble protest that he would top this stroke of genius on my part, Mag knows heís finished. Take a peek at this work of Hembeckian beauty. Unless Mag can find an unpublished doodle by the late Jack Kirby recreating this cover, the Spores battle is over and Iíve won. That said, donít tell Mag, but heís getting at least 2 more copies of the comic this Christmas and Iíll have to put a standing order in to Mike to let me know whenever they get a copy of this artificially rare piece of junk.

I cranked out another Archive entry, this time kicking off my Blackhawk indexing with a look at the Blackhawk Archives. Another thoroughly entertaining Archive collection. It also gave Mag another opportunity to explore his musical side, this time by postinga version of the Blackhawk song (the sheet music was in the Archive) recorded by a friend of ours.

The trip through Blackhawk was a blast, with the highlight being Blackhawk 240 where Andre found himself powerless to fight the worldís greatest female impersonator. I kid you not.

Proof that the Treadmill was growing up came in the form of an archenemy, who called his or her self ďU StinkĒ. We incurred the wrath of the nefarious U Stink for using the name of the DC character Tsunami. That will teach us to use words that might pop up in a studentís research google.

And I got to talk about Snit Smashing, which, outside of Scott, means nothing to any of you.

February 2005:

The highlight of the month was clearly the bloggersí universe look at 100 things you love about comics. Mag and I each posted our lists. Mine included The Human Bomb (sniff, sniff), new issues every week and Super Hero Cars, Planes and Boats. Just to clarify, Whirly-Bats, the coolest mode of transport ever, are definitely included in that grouping. Magís included Barry Allenís costume compartment ring, Elongated Manís eyes popping out and heroesí man-servants.

I also pirated a Scurvy Dogs review. Pirates are still the new monkeys. Suggestion: Try telling the joke about a pirateís favorite letter to a kindergarten class. I never got as many laughs for one joke in my life.

And in the ďwhat the heck is this entry doing on the Comic Treadmill?Ē category, I posted about a 20 year-old Rock ĎN Roll recipe book, tying it into comics by including a recipe offered by the inimitable Soupy Sales.

I also kicked off a short-lived weekly links feature, which proved to be too daunting a task in a world of blogs much better suited to link-blogging than yours truly.

March 2005:

The big news in March was that I started my letter by letter review of the DC Encyclopedia. 7 months later, Iím almost finished. Provided you consider T close enough to the end to qualify as almost. Encyclopedia entries have been a lot of fun to write.

I took a desperate look at why one of my favorite heroes, Aquaman, has such an uninspired title and recent history. Later in the year, Iíd drop his book entirely, despite owning nearly every issue of Aquaman ever published (I couldnít stomach buying the Liefeld issues either).

Mag had some fun with the DC Rarities Archive Ė an outstanding book that I have a partially written entry on myself.

April 2005:

April was a moment of pride when, the lowly Treadmill combined with the mighty Fred Hembeck (talk about teaming up a headliner with an obscure character) to help unearth the whereabouts of former Marvel writer Leon Lazarus. Last we heard Alter Egoís Jim Amash was interviewing Lazarus for a forthcoming issue. Our eyes remain anxiously glued to TwoMorrows publishing schedule to see the results.

Another highlight of the month for me was my entry on the current run of the Flash. Is it evidence of my sunny disposition that my highlight is always an entry about a book I enjoy versus one I trash? Maybe. Just donít ask me that question before 10:00 a.m. (11 on weekends) or Iíll kill you.

Indexing-wise I went through Black Orchid and the late, not-so-great Blue Beetle. And in the Encyclopedia, I breezed from the letter D through the letter I. Wow. I sure had a lot more energy when I was six months younger.

The Encyclopedia and DC Super Stars baseball game projects dominated this month with the Encyclopedia running from letters L, M and N and the ballgame getting to the 7th inning.

I also showed that when the blogosphere calls for the Treadmill to pull it weight, weíre quick to respond as I provided Scipio with the visuals of the thrilling issue of Black Condor wherein he puts down a rabid raccoon. Despite this, Scipio and I still are on speaking terms.

Indexwise, the independent review focused on Alien Worlds while the DC indexing started in on The Brave and the Bold with a look at the first ever JLA story. The DC ballgame and Encyclopedias crawled along, but letís fess up Ė I was vacationing here and there with the family most of July so it wasnít a prolific month for H entries on the Treadmill.